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Rios-Alvarado II: Expect slugfest to break out again

Sitting at home watching the savagery that was Timothy Bradley vs. Ruslan Provodnikov two weeks ago was almost too much for Brandon Rios to bear. Rios, a throwback boxer nicknamed "Bam Bam", presumably for his

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Rios-Alvarado II: Expect slugfest to break out again

Bob Velin, USA TODAY Sports
2:53 p.m. EDT March 29, 2013

Former Lightweight champion Brandon "Bam Bam" Rios works out with trainer Robert Garcia as he prepares for his rematch against Mike Alvarado Saturday at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas.(Photo: Chris Farina, Top Rank)

Story Highlights

Brandon Rios is undefeated at 31-0-1, with 23 KOs. He will meet Mike Alvarado in a rematch Saturday

The fight, at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas (HBO, 10:15 p.m. ET), will be for the interim WBO title

Their first fight last October was a candidate for the fight of the year for 2012

Sitting at home watching the savagery that was Timothy Bradley vs. Ruslan Provodnikov a few weeks ago was almost too much for Brandon Rios to bear.

Rios, a throwback boxer nicknamed "Bam Bam", presumably for his self-described delight in throwing and taking punches, couldn't have been more excited without causing damage to his television.

"I was almost jumping on the TV watching that fight," Rios said. "It brought back memories.

"They were going at it. Like they said, Bradley came out with a different game plan and he proved that he's a warrior and a fighter."

The memories that came back to Rios were made in his highly memorable fight against Mike Alvarado on Oct. 12.

They went at it, too. Both came in undefeated. They stood toe-to-toe trading punches for most of nearly seven action-packed rounds. Finally, Rios, indefatigable and shaking off Alvarado's power punches as if they were flies buzzing around his head, put away his opponent with a flurry that caused referee Pat Russell to stop the fight at 1:57 of the seventh. Too early, argued Alvarado, but to no avail.

It was clearly the fight of the year until a couple months later, when Juan Manuel Marquez stunningly knocked Manny Pacquiao out cold with one second left in the sixth round.

Rios (31-0-1, 23 KOs) and Alvarado (33-1, 23 KOs) will reprise their 140-pound war on Saturday night (10:15 ET, HBO) at Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas. This time, there is a WBO interim light welterweight title, bragging rights, a brighter future and a lot more money at stake.

Alvarado, 32, began their first fight trying to keep Rios at bay while using his boxing skills to pick and choose his shots from a distance. But it wasn't long before the relentless Rios, who knows only one way to go — forward — sucked his opponent into a slugfest, which is where it stayed the rest of the way.

Asked if this time will be different, Rios, 26, told USA TODAY Sports, "I expect the same type of fight. I think Mike Alvarado is probably going to box, and keep me on the outside, but it's not going to last too long, because once he feels the power and the punches, and sees that I keep coming like a machine, he's going to do the thing he does best. And that's to fight and be in center ring again."

While Alvarado, a Denver native nicknamed "Mile High," felt Rios' punches, and eventually submitted to them, Rios proclaimed he was never hurt.

Looking back: Rios vs. Alvarado

HBO takes a look back at the first meeting between Brandon Rios and Mike Alvarado.

"Never hurt me at all," Rios said. "I never got stunned, never was dazed, nothing. I always was ready and he never hurt me."

Nonetheless, Rios ate plenty of punches in the six-plus rounds. Asked if his brain ever tells him he's taking too many hits to the head, Rios laughed. "When I get hit my brain tells me, 'You're the (bleeping) man, Brandon, you are the man!' That's why I always come back (to my corner) with a smile."

Rios smiles when he gets hit, he says, not to be cocky, or to try to psyche out his opponent. "It's just when I get hit, I'm admiring it. 'Yeah, you got me with that punch, now it's my turn.'

"It's not that I'm trying to psyche them out, that's just me. I'm always smiling 'cause I love boxing so much. It's what I love to do."

Alvarado loves the sport, too, and his first career loss was hard to swallow. To add insult to injury, he felt he could have fought on, saying referee Russell stopped it too early in a close fight. At the time of the stoppage, two judges had it tied and one had Rios ahead by two points.

Alvarado compared it to Bradley-Provodnikov, also refereed by Russell.

"I think Bradley got more a chance with the same ref than I did," Alvarado told USA TODAY Sports. "I didn't get a chance to at least hit the canvas or come back a little bit. He jumped in pretty quick. Yeah, they were heavy shots, but I wasn't hurt as bad as Bradley was."

Indeed, Bradley appeared out on his feet twice during the fight, which he came back to win.

The loss, Alvarado says, was a blessing in the sense that it helped him focus more on the task at hand. "It focused me more, it humbled me more, it was tough at first," he says. "But it happens.

"It only made me stronger. It only made me better this time around, because I know I can be beat. It makes me that much smarter in the ring."

Alvarado admits he stood in there with Rios way too much in the first fight.

"I didn't step back, I stood right in there with him, but when I did move around and step around, I had the edge," he says. "I was the better fighter, I got the better shots, I had better angles, so I'm just going to move more, tighten up my defense and fight my fight."

Road to Rios-Alvarado II

Brandon Rios and Mike Alvarado prepare for their rematch.

And most of all, fight with his head, not his heart.

"When I fight with my heart, I turn it into a war," he says. "But when I use my skills, utilize my talent, I can make the fight go my way."

And that's important because of the enormity of the outcome. "It means a lot," Alvarado says. "It enables me to redeem myself, and puts me in a better position for my boxing career.

"It's huge for me. It's my first time headlining a main event on HBO, so it means a lot for me this time around, more than the first fight."

Hot about Cold War: Rios doesn't know which opponents are in his immediate future, but he does know who they will not be, and he's not happy about it. Rios says the cold war that has existed for several years between boxing's two biggest promoters — his Top Rank group and Oscar De La Hoya's Golden Boy Promotions — needs to end soon, because there are too many fighters at 140 and 147 pounds that would ordinarily be available to choose from that are off-limits right now.

"Pretty soon they're going to have to call 'capice' and make the fights," Rios told USA TODAY Sports, "because if there's another big money fight at 147, I'm not going to move up. I've barely moved up to 140, so why go to 147 if there's not a big name? In order to have all the big names, they got to (make peace) and get the fights on."